Looted Cultural Heritage or Collateral Damage?: Depends on who you ask

Tangible cultural heritage is crucial to knowledge and belief systems for both individuals and wider societies or nations. For this reason, it is often among the first to be targeted during times of conflict by aggressors who aim to loot objects for their monetary value, in which case they are either divvied up among soldiers as payment or later sold in the hopes of recovering some of their conflict-related expenses. More common, however, is that the aggressors target such objects for the intangible ideas they represent. In this instance, looted objects are destroyed in an effort to erase the systems and collective memory of the cultural group from where they came, or they are kept by the aggressor for their ability to materialise and remind viewers of an otherwise intangible victory. This was common practice for the ancient Greeks and Romans and is still seen in many contemporary conflicts, but looted cultural heritage has never quite captured attention and curiosity quite like that which was seen during and after World War II, although the true power of tangible cultural heritage is revealed in the efforts to recover objects looted by the aggressors, especially when juxtaposed with the drastically different efforts to find what was taken from them in the immediate aftermath of surrender.

Figure 1: Portrait of A Young Man (1513)

If you have seen the 2014 movie The Monuments Men, you probably know of the real life Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives Section Unit (MFAA), collectively referred to as the ‘Monuments Men’, who were tasked with recovering the artworks and artefacts that had been looted by Nazi soldiers during various WWII campaigns.1 Adapted from Robert M. Edsel and Bret Witter’s non-fiction book The Monuments Men: Allied Heroes, Nazi Thieves and the Greatest Treasure Hunt in History, the film follows a division of the unit as they travel across Western Europe in search of several high-profile stolen works. While some of this movie is fact and some is fictionalised for dramatic effect, in the final scene unit leader Frank Stokes, played by George Clooney, gives a lengthy and somewhat heartfelt speech to a group of men, one of which is the then-U.S. President Harry S. Truman, discussing the significant role art plays as a tangible relic of European and Western history while highlighting one looted artwork as being particularly important – Raphael’s 1513 painting, Portrait of A Young Man.

Stolen in 1939 by Nazi forces, prior to WWII the painting resided in Poland as part of the private collection of the Czartoryski family who purchased it along with Da Vinci’s Lady with an Ermine (1489-91) in 1801.2 Upon Germany’s invasion of Poland, the Czartoryski Museum, where both of these paintings were held, hid most of the collection in the Museum’s basement and evacuated its most treasured pieces to Sieniawa, a small town in the South-East of the country, in an effort to save them from falling into enemy hands. Such efforts were, however, in vain, as both locations were soon discovered and the artworks, including Lady with an Ermine and Portrait of a Young Man, were confiscated to become the prized exhibits of the planned Führermuseum.3

As the Führermuseum was yet to be built when the work was seized, Portrait of a Young Man was moved several times between high-ranking German officials and to various offices across occupied territories before ending up in the possession of Chief Nazi administrator of occupied Poland, Hans Frank, who took it back to Poland for display in his private quarters at Wawel Castle. The painting has never been seen again. When Frank fled Poland for Germany in early 1945, it wasn’t one of the works he took with him, and following his arrest a few months later it was one of thousands of artworks and artefacts in the castle’s inventory logs, but soon identified as one of 843 to be missing from storage.4 While thousands of artworks, including Lady with an Ermine, were later recovered from castles and mines across Europe, the true fate of Portrait of a Young Man may never be known, and it is often thought to have been destroyed alongside the work of Western art’s most famous artists, such as Caravaggio’s Portrait of A Young Woman (c.1598), Courbet’s The Stone Breakers (1849) and van Gogh’s Painter on His Way to Work (1888).

Figure 2: Portrait of a Young Woman (c.1598)

Figure 3: The Stone Brekaers (1849)

Figure 4: Vincent van Gogh, Painter on His Way to Work (1888)

Whether or not Portrait of a Young Man was (or is) a genuine Raphael painting continues to be debated, with some scholars arguing that its Mannerist features suggest it must have been painted much later than 1513 and following the recorded development of the Mannerism style in 1520, the same year Raphael died. Other scholars point to a variety of compositional elements to suggest the painting is “unharmonious” and therefore entirely unlike the refined classicism seen in Raphael’s other paintings from the same time, such as Portrait of Maddalena Doni (1506) or Portrait of Bindo Altoviti (1515), and some argue that it cannot be genuine as it differs from the Umbrian or Florentine portraiture styles that Raphael was educated in.5 Although none of these arguments take into consideration that, much like contemporary artists, it is entirely possible the artist was simply experimenting with new techniques or, perhaps, that the painting remained unfinished before his death or that it was the work of a pupil of his studio. Nonetheless, having no physical painting to examine and very few quality images available means that this debate will likely keep raging, but such uncertainty has only added to the painting’s significance with continuous efforts to find Portrait of a Young Man being led by Poland’s Ministry of Culture and National Heritage Division for Looted Art, who monitor the global art market for any sign of the missing painting along with the estimated 516,000 other works of art looted by Germany from public and private Polish collections in WWII.6

Figure 5: Portrait of Bindo Altoviti (1515)

Figure 6: Portrait of Maddalena Doni (1506)

Likewise, the Monuments Men and Women Foundation, founded by Edsel in 2007 in honour of the MFAA, continue to search with a $25,000 reward offered for information that leads to the recovery of Portrait of a Young Man, and they also raise awareness for looted art, most recently by printing 52 unrecovered artworks onto their WWII Most Wanted Art™ Deck of Playing Cards that you can purchase for the low cost of $14.95 excluding sales tax and shipping.7 Unsurprisingly, the vast majority of what little loot has been recovered from the purging is the work of European artists which was kept as examples of degeneracy, and used to turn public opinion against Modernism, or because it supported the narrative of the Aryan race. Objects reflecting an ethnicity other than Aryan were slated for destruction, along with the people, beliefs and knowledge it represented.8 This was especially true for the non-Western art plundered from public and private collections, which was quickly destroyed, and while select non-Western cultures have been granted the attention of Western recovery efforts, such attention is restricted to that which was looted by Germany, the conflict’s aggressors, and reflects traditional narratives of civilisation. The same gallant efforts cannot be seen for objects looted by Allied forces.

Figure 7: WWII Most Wanted Art™ playing cards, from the Monuments Men and Women Foundation.

Also falling victim to looting amongst the chaos of the days following the end of WWII is Japan’s Honjo Masamune sword, made by legendary 13th century swordsmith, Gorō Nyūdō Masamune (c.1264-c.1343). However, unlike that which was looted by Germany, the sword was one of many artworks and artefacts of Japan’s cultural heritage to be confiscated from Japanese citizens, and later lost, by the victorious United States.9 Much in the same way Germany planned to display looted relics of cultural heritage in the Führermuseum to remind viewers of their superiority, the U.S. took ownership of all ceremonial and decorative swords, daggers, bows and arrows, spears and armour, and required these to be handed over from both public and private collections in order to strip the surrendered nation of its ability to weaponize by any means, and the subsequent withholding of these objects perpetuates the erasure of Japan’s cultural history.

Figure 8: Japanese sword made by 13th century sword smith Gorō Nyūdō Masamune.

An abundance of Japanese legends and folklore exalt smiths and their swords to a god-like status, but none were venerated more than Masamune – it was said that his blades sought blood in order to survive.10 Such legends, alongside the quality of his craftsmanship, have resulted in both Masamune and his swords being highly revered by centuries of Japanese royalty and social elite. As one of the pioneers of the Soshu tradition of sword forging, whereby multiple types of steel with higher and lower carbon content are mixed together and finished with a nie-laden hardening technique resulting in an extremely sharp and strong blade, Masamune’s swords and daggers remain extremely sought after.11 With the earliest documented case of Masamune’s swords being given as gifts to between Japan’s elite classes dating from 1533, and his appearance in Japan’s oldest surviving sword publication, the Mei Zukushi, published in 1423 as a handwritten copy of a publication from the late Kamakura Period (1185-1333), the sword was an established and deeply important relic of Japan’s cultural history.12 While the exact date of the sword’s creation is unknown, analysis of its design and materials estimate it to have been smithed in the late Kamakura period (1192-1333), which would have made it one of the last swords he crafted. It is likely that this is the reason the sword was targeted by a member of the U.S. Army during their occupation of Japan following WWII, who then quickly lost it.

Figure 9: Mei Zukushi publication.

This particular sword can be seen throughout Japanese history, being named after the 16th century General Honjo Shigenaga who served the Uesugi clan in northern Japan, eventually finding its way into the collection of the Tokugawa family where it was passed down from one generation to the next throughout their 300-year dynasty. That was until 1945 when it was confiscated by the U.S. Army on behalf of the Allied forces.13 While awaiting processing at a U.S. Army base, the sword was checked out of holding by one ‘Colby Bimore’, who stated he was a U.S. Army Sergeant of the 7th cavalry regiment, although it was later discovered that the man had used a fake name as there was no Colby Bimore in that regiment – Masamune’s sword had been stolen.14 It has not been seen since and, beyond confirming there was no Colby Bimore in 7th cavalry regiment, the U.S. has repeatedly refused to cooperate in efforts to find the stolen sword, all while continuing to support and praise the Monuments Men and Women Foundation in their pursuits of stolen artworks and artefacts.

Figure 10: President Harry S. Truman Receives a Japanese Masamune sword, March 4, 1946.

This, however, is not the only Masamune sword to have been confiscated by the U.S. Army and to remain in U.S. collections as trophies of war. Currently in the town of Independence, Missouri, lies at least one Masamune sword, confiscated in the wake of Japan’s surrender, that remains tucked away in the Truman Library. On March 4, 1946, then-President Harry S. Truman was given a 650 year-old Masamune sword from U.S. Army General Walter Krueger, who was one of the commanders of the 10th Army forces occupying post-war Japan and enforcing the conditions of surrender, and Truman then ‘donated’ the sword to his namesake library upon its opening.15 In the 79 years since, it has been seen in several of the library’s exhibitions, such as the 1963 Winning World War II exhibit where it was displayed along-side other WWII artefacts including a Nazi flag, a Belgian urn, a Metz flag, a model of the French Liberation Monument, a Nazi sword and scabbard and, to make the message of victory clear, a photo of the atomic bomb exploding over Nagasaki.16

Figure 11: 'Winning WWII' Exhibition Case at the Truman Library. February 1963.

While the U.S. went to great lengths to ensure Lady with an Ermine never got to be a trophy in the Führermuseum and the artwork was not used to erase Western Europe’s cultural memory, the same cannot be said for Masamune’s sword, which has been used to strip Japan of its tangible cultural history and remind them of their defeat for almost 80 years. Similarly, the West’s determination to find WWII looted art is shown to be limited to that which was looted from them, with the trophies they themselves claimed from vanquished nations rarely being given the same treatment and the objects they lost in the process viewed as little more than inconsequential collateral damage.

Figure 12: Monuments Man Lt. Frank P. Albright, Polish Liaison Officer Maj. Karol Estreicher, Monuments Man Capt. Everett Parker Lesley, and Pfc. Joe D. Espinosa, guard with the 34th Field Artillery Battalion, pose with Leonardo da Vinci's Lady with an Ermine upon its return to Poland in April 1946.

1. George Clooney, Director, Monuments Men (2014), Disney +, 1:59:07, online video, https://www.disneyplus.com/movies/the-monuments-men/7LzzUZO8bO7m

2. Janusz Wałek, “The Czartoryski ‘Portrait of a Youth’ by Raphael”, in Artibus et Historiae 12, no.24 (1991): 201-24, https://doi.org/10.2307/1483421

3. Józef Grabski, “The Lost ‘Portrait of a Young Man’ (Attributed to Raphael) from the Collection of the Princes Czartoryski Family in Cracow: A Contribution to Studies on the Typology of the Renaissance Portrait”, in Artibus et Historiae 25, no.50 (2004): 215-39, https://doi.org/10.2307/1483795.

4. Grabski, “The Lost ‘Portrait of a Young Man’ (Attributed to Raphael) from the Collection of the Princes Czartoryski Family in Cracow”, 215-39.

5. Ibid, 224.

6. The Ministry of Culture and National Heritage Division for Looted Art, “Objects Lost as a Result of the Second World War”, Looted Art, 2014, http://lootedart.gov.pl/en/ 

7. “WWII Most Wanted Art™”, Monuments Men and Women Foundation, 2023, https://www.monumentsmenandwomenfnd.org/join-the-hunt/wwii-most-wanted.

8. Laura Holsomback Zelman, “Looting and Restitution During World War II: A Comparison Between The Soviet Union Trophy Commission and The Western Allies Monuments, Fine Arts, And Archives Commission” (Master of Arts thesis, University of North Texas, 2012), https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc115187/m2/1/high_res_d/thesis.pdf

9. Markus Sesko, Masamune: His Work, His Fame and His Legacy, (North Carolina: Lulu, 2015), 9-75, https://books.google.com.au/bookshl=en&lr=&id=RYCpCQAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PA9&dq=masamune+sword&ots=bohxVwNBgw&sig=ZyVnVBxz8o22FdrNCoZSqNQX52Q#v=onepage&q=masamune%20sword&f=false

10. Jerry Alan Harwell, “History and Development of the Japanese Samurai Sword”, MA Thesis, California State University, 1991, ProQuest Dissertations Publishing (1345866).

11. Sesko, Masamune.

12. Japan, “Digital Collections, no. WA1-4”, National Diet Library, 2023 https://dl.ndl.go.jp/info:ndljp/pid/1288371?itemId=info%3Andljp%2Fpid%2F1288371&__lang=en

13. Stephen Turnbull, The Samurai: A Military History (London: Taylor & Francis Group, 1996).

14. Sesko, “Masamune: His Work, His Fame and His Legacy”.

15. ‘President Harry S. Truman Receives Sword’, March 4, 1946, National Archives: Harry S. Truman Library Museum, https://www.trumanlibrary.gov/photograph-records/64-131 

16. National Archives: Harry S. Truman Library Museum, “Winning WWII Exhibit Case, Truman Library”, National Archives: Harry S. Truman Library Museum, February 1963, https://www.trumanlibrary.gov/photograph-records/63-1507

Figure 1: Raphael, Portrait of A Young Man (1513-14). Oil on panel, 72 x 56 cm. Unknown location.

Figure 2: Caravaggio, Portrait of a Young Woman (1601). Oil on canvas, 66 x 33 cm. Destroyed, 1945.

Figure 3: Gustave Courbet, The Stone Breakers (1849). Oil on canvas, 165 x 257 cm. Destroyed in bombing, 1945.

Figure 4: Vincent van Gogh, The Painter on His Way to Work (1888). Oil on canvas, 48 x 44 cm. Destroyed in air raid, 1945.

Figure 5: Raphael, Portrait of Bindo Altoviti (1515). Oil on panel, 59.7 x 43.8 cm. National Gallery of Art, United States.

Figure 6: Raphael, Portrait of Maddalena Doni (1506). Oil on canvas, 63.5 x 45 cm. Ufizzi Palace, Italy.

Figure 7: “WWII Most Wanted Art™,” playing cards, image via Monuments Men and Women Foundation.

Figure 8: Japan, National Treasures & Important Cultural Properties of National Institutes for Cultural Heritage, item number F-19916.

Figure 9: Mei Zukushi (1423), National Diet Library Digital Collections, “Digital Collections, no. WA1-4”, National Diet Library, 2023 https://dl.ndl.go.jp/info:ndljp/pid/1288371?itemId=info%3Andljp%2Fpid%2F1288371&__lang=en

Figure 10: 'President Harry S. Truman Receives Sword', March 4, 1946, image via National Archives: Harry S. Truman Library Museum.

Figure 11: 'Winning WWII Exhibit Case, Truman Library', February 1963, image via National Archives: Harry S. Truman Library Museum.

Figure 12: 'Return of Leonardo da Vinci's Lady with an Ermine to Poland', April 1946, image via Monuments Men and Women Foundation.